Processors and related computer components are becoming more powerful with increasing capabilities, resulting in increasing amounts of heat dissipated from these components. Simultaneously, package and die sizes of the components are decreasing or remaining the same, which increases the amount of heat energy given off by the component for a given unit of surface area. Furthermore, as computer related equipment becomes more powerful, more and more components are being placed inside the equipment which is also decreasing in size, resulting in additional heat generation in a smaller volume of space. Increased temperatures can potentially damage the components of the equipment, or reduce the lifetime of the individual components and the equipment.
Heat sinks have been used to assist in dissipating heat from the processor and other heat producing components within a housing. The overall size of the heat sink is limited by the volume constraints of the housing. To maximize the amount of heat dissipated from the heat producing components, there is a need to maximize the surface area of the heat sink without increasing the volume of the heat sink, such as by maximizing pin density on the heat sink. However, current manufacturing methods of heat sinks, such as machining or casting, are limited in the ability to maximize the surface area. Furthermore, some of these methods can be expensive.
For the reasons stated above, and for other reasons stated below which will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon reading and understanding the present specification, there is a need for a more efficient method to produce heat sinks. There is also a need for a heat sink which maximizes heat dissipation capabilities. What is also needed is a way to produce low cost heat sinks with higher convection surface area to heat sink volume ratio.